Online advertising has changed the way the advertising value chain was created. It is still the same concepts, as you can see in IBM's image above, but the channels have shifted directions and outlets. The online advertising chain is composed of 6 sequences. We are going to focus those six sequences on three roles: the advertiser, content producer and consumer and how those work/ evolved.
(from IBM Institute)You start with the advertiser who has taken a major role in online advertising. Then you go to the creative advertising agency, which use to follow traditional direct marketing tactics, but since 2007, has shifted to more interactive planning for both the advertiser and the consumer. Creative Advertising Agency and Media Planning is the next step but, over the years it has combined roles with the advertising agency. By doing this, the advertiser plans out how and where they are going to advertise their product to the consumer and what they are going to do to make their product stand out. The most popular strategies that the advertiser can use are Link exchanges, Newsletter advertising and Budgeted advertising. The first strategy is very useful for the starting businesses with the limited budget. It does not boost the company growth, but helps to find other merchants, trade links with them, keep track site traffic. Newsletter ad strategy is the best way to target the specific group of customers, but it also can be expensive. The last strategy is probably the most suitable and profitable for small business because it allows planning and controlling the budget, to foresee the best ways as well as the limits for the successful Ad campaign.
The next role is content owner/producer, which still plays a major role in the adverting chain and will most likely remain the same for future advertising. Within the producing role is the media aggregator/distributer, which is how the advertisement gets distributed. Broadcasters have remained the same but the traditional distributors, such as telco, have taken a step back since 2007 and the internet/ mobile phone seems to have taken its place. Online advertising has opened the doors to so many different outlets and will consistently dominate others in terms of outlets.
Finally the consumer is the last part of the online advertising chain. This has not changed over the years, however, it has taken on a more pressing role since 2007. Online advertisements have not only been opened up to a much larger audience, but have also been selective and targeted for directly to the consumers ( see Facebook blog). This creates a whole new role for the consumer in the world of online advertising.
So, what does this all say- the three major roles in online advertisement is the advertiser, content producers and consumer. All the other parts are taking on more of a support system role for those three roles.
